Total pages in book: 82
Estimated words: 78237 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 391(@200wpm)___ 313(@250wpm)___ 261(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78237 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 391(@200wpm)___ 313(@250wpm)___ 261(@300wpm)
I pump my fifty-year-old legs as hard and as fast as I can, pushing through a wooden door and into what looks like a bar with pool tables and dart boards taking up space on the walls.
The door. It’s about thirty, maybe fifty feet away. I run toward it, toward the sunlight that filters just inside the room. Excitement builds as I draw closer to the door and time slows down.
Wilder puts himself between me and the door at the last second. I’m so close my fingers wrap around the metal door handle.
“No!” The sadness and anguish in my voice is palpable. The disappointment at my thwarted escape rushes over me, covering me in ice. Not even the heat of Wilder’s body can warm it.
“Maven,” he growls sympathetically, even as his arms wrap around my midsection and he lifts me in the air.
For a moment, I’m totally still. Frozen in shock or fear, or maybe it’s just disappointment that I’m probably going to die in some off-book biker bar.
In the next moment, though, my fight-or-flight instinct chooses to fight. I kick and scream and squirm in his arms, anything I can do to make it difficult for Wilder.
“This is bullshit! Let me go!” The more I squirm against his hot, hard body, the more aware I am of him as a man.
He’s fit as fuck. Muscles cover every inch of him that I can feel, and there’s nothing I can do to talk my wayward nipples down.
Fucking traitors.
It’s stupid to have this reaction to a twenty-seven-year-old kid. Especially one who’s holding me hostage for information I don’t have. I start kicking and squirming with a vengeance I didn’t know I had.
“Let me go right now!”
“Can’t do that, babe,” he grunts in my ear, still holding me easily as I thrash around like a rabid animal. “Sorry.”
“No, you’re not!” I say, suddenly aware of the people watching the show as he carries me through the bar. “Don’t add lying to your other sins.”
He sets me down in the middle of the bar, and I take off again toward the door. I don’t make it three steps before Wilder is in front of me. Like a brick wall. Again. Tossing me over his shoulder. Again.
“Behave,” he says and smacks me on my ass before continuing back to the room where I’m destined to stay until my time runs out.
Wilder kicks the door shut and tosses me on the bed, where he then stands over me to see if I’ll try to take off again. “Are you ready to be reasonable?”
I let out a very unladylike bark of laughter. “The guy who kidnapped me and locked me in a room is talking about being reasonable. What a fucking joke.”
I turn on my side and give Wilder my back, sick of this same old back and forth. I don’t have to like being at his mercy, but that’s the current state of things.
He lets out a loud sigh, and I feel the bed dip beside me.
“Someone in the Iron Kings went through a lot of trouble to set my MC up for human trafficking, and we don’t do that shit,” he says vehemently. “Gia and I have been working hard to find out the depths of the frame job and who did it. On top of that, according to you, they’re gearing up for war, and we’re the enemy they’re lining up against.”
“I don’t care,” I tell him softly.
“I’m getting that,” he says, his voice tinged with amusement. “But you might know more than you realize. All we want is a conversation or two to find out for sure.”
I let out a low, shaky breath. “And when you realize I have nothing of importance to offer, then what?”
“Then we’ll let you go, but only when it’s safe to do so.” Wilder’s hand is big and warm when it lands on my thigh. “Maven, we captured their President, and that’s some serious shit. If they even suspect you’re involved with us in any way, you are a target.”
I jackknife up at his words and shoot an angry glare at him. “Well, the only reason they would think that is because you waltzed into my shop like you owned the place and then brought me to your headquarters!”
“None of which I can undo now. Just talk to me, Maven. Please?”
It’s the plea that gets to me. Instead of using fists or coercion, he uses manners. Works every fucking time.
“Look, Wilder, I don’t know anything, and even if you think I might, I have to think about myself. My shop and my life, none of which you and your club actually care about.”
“You’re wrong,” he says quietly. “We do care. And I’m sorry that we’ve put you in this position, but we need your help.”
I shake my head and push away from him. “I can’t do this.”